I shall use my column this week to share the homily I preached in the Cathedral for the formal closing of the Bicentennial Year of the Sisters of St Joseph of Cluny.

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“My Sisters and Brothers,
In my homily during the liturgy in the magnificent chapel of St Joseph’s Convent on November 12, 2006 which opened the Bicentennial Year of the Sisters of St Joseph of Cluny and again in my brief address at the recent historical exhibition at the National Library on October 22, 2007, I expressed the hope that the Bicentennial Year would not only be a review of and a celebration of the significant history of the Cluny Community.

I reminded the participants at the opening liturgy and at the historical exhibition that no matter how proud they are of Cluny history (and everyone associated with the Cluny Community should be very proud of that history), an overemphasis on looking back is insufficient and even limiting for those responsible for planning the future. 

At the opening liturgy and at the historical exhibition, I asked the Cluny Community to make the Bicentennial Year a year of renewal based on the charism of your community, the life of your Foundress and a renewed openness to the power of the Holy Spirit.

Why did I make that request? I made the request because I wanted the Community to emerge from the Bicentennial Year as a recommitted Community that was filled with zeal for the kingdom, with confidence in the potential of the Cluny Community and with prudential courage to build the future.

Taken together these three elements will motivate a preference for looking forward not backwards and seeing in the future not only challenges but, more importantly, opportunities.

The readings you have chosen for this liturgy that will close the Bicentennial Year offer Christian insight into how to move forward into the future. The first reading may sound somewhat strange for this liturgy.

It is about fasting. Isaiah is speaking about the meaning of fasting because he understands that fasting helps create the proper conditions and attitudes for pastoral planning and pastoral service.

The reading from Matthew’s Gospel is a reflection on the absolutely essential theme of trust in Divine Providence as believers accept responsibility for making decisions to help build the kingdom. 
Let us look briefly at each reading:

The Prophet Isaiah

Isaiah is reflecting on the true meaning of fasting. He condemns empty fasting i.e. fulfilling rituals without a change of heart and expecting those empty rituals to earn divine mercy.

Fundamentally, fasting is a detachment from sin and selfishness. Fasting should always be coupled with almsgiving to avoid a turning in on oneself. In defining fasting, Isaiah does not concentrate primarily on the physical discipline involved in fasting, he turns to the social aspects of fasting – works of justice, caring for the poor, helping the spiritually blind – these works are signs of authentic fasting and the light that points to the presence of the messianic age.

What is the application of Isaiah’s teaching on true fasting to you, the Cluny Community, as you prepare to write a new chapter of your history? His message is “do not turn in on yourselves.” Always move outward.

Remember your history! For example, your educational ministry has not only liberated women and enabled them to excel and to contribute to society, it has taught them values that have protected them from becoming secular and helped them to persevere in meeting the new challenges of our age.

Read the signs of the times and respond to them – the educational needs, the social needs and the spiritual needs of contemporary society. Responding to the signs of the times can be exciting and the relevance of involvement will very probably attract candidates to the community.

Show life and you will draw life. Turning in on yourselves may lead to short term safety but it will eventually lead to pastoral irrelevance.

The Gospel of Matthew

Matthew challenges us about trusting Divine Providence. By definition, Divine Providence means the protection and governance of God over all creation.

God is the Lord of history. Do we believe that truth? Sometimes believing in that truth is difficult because so many things have gone wrong throughout the world. The trust that is based on faith and which flows from faith can also be challenging.

People who believe can look at situations and see opportunities that others cannot see. People who do not really believe cannot see the opportunities in the situations just the challenges. A similar statement can be made about trust. People who trust can move forward. People who do not trust frequently become trapped in fear.

The definition of Divine Providence can either be a pious concept or it can be the driving force that will lead the Community into the future. What explains the difference? The answer to that question is whether you trust Divine Providence or not.

The saints were able to trust in really bad times because of the depth of their faith. They accomplished wonderful things for God and for God’s People.

Other religious leaders, who were very nice people, could not bring themselves to trust so they did nothing. History does not even remember their names. Their Communities are gone.

There have been many times in the history of Religious Communities when, from the viewpoint of the secular eye, they made many apparently foolish decisions, seemingly impossible decisions to implement. In truth, they took a leap of faith, they trusted God and they made a significant difference in history.

What is the application of Matthew’s gospel to this celebration? The application is that you have decisions to make as a Community that is alive in the Spirit. How are you going to make those decisions? What criteria shall you use?

For a Religious Apostolic Community, decision making must include Isaiah’s teaching on fasting because it will help protect you as a Community from blindness, selfishness and turning in on yourselves. You must also consider Mathew’s recommendation: trust in God’s providence because it will free you to accept risks.

Trust fits well with the quotation from your Foundress that is on the first page of your programme. Your foundress, Anne Marie Javouhey, taught “When we belong to God, we are no longer in charge of our will; we must only wish what God wishes and nothing else.”

Concluding observations

As you close your Bicentennial Year, only you know how you have emerged from this special year of grace as individual religious and as an Apostolic Religious Community.

However, in time, by watching you, by reflecting on your decisions, by collaborating with you and by benefiting from your witness and ministry, we will learn how you emerged from your Bicentennial Year.

I am certain that the next chapter of your Community’s story will build on your prior history. It will lift up the Cluny Community, the archdiocese, the nation and the Caribbean region because you have renewed your surrender to God through true fasting and you have deepened your trust in God’s providence.

Consequently, you are spiritually free. When a Community is spiritually free, it can plan, it can give life-giving witness and it has the energy to serve pastorally with confidence.

We thank you for your history and for how it contributed to the life of the Archdiocese. We ask God to bless your Community and the role it will play in the future.”